A longtime ally of House Speaker Michael Madigan is trying to thwart efforts to ask voters whether to impose term limits on lawmakers and curb some of the politics in drawing new legislative district boundaries before the two proposed constitutional amendments have even landed on the ballot.

Election-law attorney Michael Kasper, who once was the speaker’s legal counsel, filed a lawsuit a day before proponents of the proposed term-limit amendment submitted more than 591,000 petition signatures to the State Board of Elections on Wednesday to launch the formal process to submit the plan to voters this fall. The proposal was heavily backed by Republican governor candidate Bruce Rauner.

The suit comes as backers of a plan to create a more independent panel to redraw Illinois’ 59 state Senate and 118 House boundaries prepare to turn in more than 530,000 petition signatures to the elections board on Thursday. The Yes for Independent Maps drive received support from a variety of Republican and Democratic-aligned groups.

Both proposals need a minimum of almost 300,000 valid signatures from registered voters to meet one eligibility criteria for the Nov. 4 general election ballot.

The two ballot initiatives have something in common: opposition from Speaker Madigan, who also is chairman of the Illinois Democratic Party. Kasper, who sued Tuesday in Cook County Circuit Court, also has served as a top Democratic Party official.

Kasper’s clients in the suit range from prominent Chicago African-American businessmen, including Frank Clark, Leon Finney, Elzie Higginbottom and John Hooker, to the chambers of commerce in the city neighborhoods of Chinatown and Little Village, as well as members of the NACCP in Peoria.

The lawsuit comes less than two weeks after an hour-long River North restaurant luncheon of more than 50 representatives of groups providing services to ethnic and racial minorities that featured Kasper and controversial Latino political activist and lobbyist Victor Reyes. The two urged group members to sign onto a taxpayers’ lawsuit to challenge the proposed amendments, said sources who asked not to be identified for fear of risking their ability to secure state grant dollars.

The emailed luncheon invitations came from the office of state Rep. Edward Acevedo and asked invitees to join the lawmaker and “Speaker Michael Madigan,” though Madigan did not attend. Acevedo is a member of Madigan’s House Democratic leadership team.

Acevedo, Kasper and Reyes did not respond to requests for comment. Madigan, who has served as speaker for 29 of the past 31 years, has made little secret of his distaste for the proposed amendments — labeling each as little more than an attempt by out-of-power Republicans to restrict Democrats.

At the heart of the taxpayer lawsuit are previous Illinois Supreme Court rulings involving petition-driven efforts to change the state constitution. The only part of the constitution that can be amended through the petition process must affect the legislature — and the state’s highest court has created only a narrow window, ruling that any proposed change must affect the legislature both structurally and procedurally.

The lawsuit contends the term-limit amendment proposal attempts to string together several unrelated issues to try to meet the court’s structural and procedural court test.

In addition to limiting legislative service to eight years, the proposed term limit amendment would require a two-thirds vote of the House and Senate to override a governor’s veto rather than the current three-fifths vote. It also would increase the size of the House from 118 to 123 members while reducing the Senate from 59 to 41 members. It also would eliminate the two-year terms that senators serve once every decade.

The lawsuit contends the state Supreme Court previously held that term limits, on its own, did not meet the structural and procedural test. It also alleged the increase in votes needed to override a veto was an “impermissible” transfer of power from the legislature to the governor.

As for the soon-to-be-filed remap proposal, the lawsuit notes the plan would prevent anyone serving on a newly constituted 11-member redistricting commission from becoming a lawmaker, statewide elected official or judge for 10 years. The suit contended that the new prohibitions affected qualifications for office and exceeded the scope of petition-driven amendment proposals.

The suit also alleged the redistricting proposal improperly goes beyond the legislative section of the state constitution by reducing the power of the attorney general and the governor by largely taking away their current roles in the remap process. Further, the suit states, the proposal goes too far by denying the General Assembly the right to redraw boundaries.

Supporters of both proposed ballot questions expressed confidence that their proposals would meet the state Supreme Court’s previous rulings.

“We have crafted this very carefully to overcome the judicial challenge that caused that term-limits initiative to fail 20 years ago,” Rauner said. “This initiative is designed specifically to overcome that because it’s comprehensive. It’s eight years and out. It’s structural change in the House-member ratio to the Senate, and it’s also procedural change with the veto (override).”

Michael Kolenc, the campaign manager for the Yes for Independent Maps drive, said the remap plan was constitutional.

“Madigan’s blatantly political attempt to question the constitutionality of Independent Maps is nothing more than a distraction from the back-room dealing that happens with redistricting,” Kolenc said.

“This is the very type of amendment that the drafters of the Illinois constitution expected should bypass the legislature because the incumbent members of the Illinois General Assembly have no incentive to fix the system that keeps them in office for decades,” he said.

In a document sent to luncheon attendees last month, Madigan contended the independent map-drawing proposal would “diminish the number of minority districts” and that “minority groups would lose their opportunity to demand the ability to elect candidates of their own choice.”

But advocates of the proposed constitutional amendment note the measure puts in writing critical parts of the federal Voting Rights Act aimed at protecting minority rights in drawing map lines. They also contend that forcing the mapmaking out of political backrooms and into public meetings places important transparency guarantees to minorities.

“They’re saying the map (amendment) dilutes Latino concentration and representation. In point of fact, our true blue legislature already did that. There were no gains when there should have been substantial gains,” said Sylvia Puente, executive director of the Latino Policy Forum, which endorsed the redistricting amendment proposal more than a year ago.

“From our point of view, the process did not work this last time and we think, the Latino Policy Forum thinks, that Yes for Independent Maps will result in more equitable Latino representation or representation to serve their interests,” said Puente, who was not invited to Madigan’s lunch.

Puente and others, noting the 33 percent growth in Illinois’ Latino population over the past decade, unsuccessfully argued during the last remapping that the state could have as many as 13 districts drawn with a Latino population of 65 percent or better but only ended up with seven such districts. One of them is Madigan’s Southwest Side district.

The current map, drawn by Democratic lawmakers and signed by Democratic Gov. Pat Quinn with no Republican input, has led to Madigan and Senate President John Cullerton, D-Chicago, holding super majorities over GOP lawmakers.